From coast to coast by night and day, hear the clickin' of the wheelsThe hummin' of the diesel, of her ribbons of steelCarryin' the memories of a nation built by handSee the Indian Pacific span the land

She's the pride of all the railway men 'cross country where she fliesFrom blue Pacific waters to where the mountains riseBy lakes and wide brown rivers, through desert country drySee the Indian Pacific passin' by

Oh the Indian Pacific she goes rollin' down the trackFive thousand miles to travel before she's there and backBeside the line, a drover waves his battered old grey hatAnd kids are catchin' yabbies down by the river flatAnd a woman hangs her washing in a backyard near the lineAs the Indian Pacific's rollin' by

Hear the whistle blowin' lonely 'neath the Nullabor star lightSaluting those who walk across the track she romps tonightCallin' to the railway camp and the fitters on the lineI'm the Indian Pacific, right on time

From the silver of the Broken Hill to old Kalgoorlie goldShe mirrors all the colours of the land so hot and oldThen the western clouds are blooming and the air is just like wineAnd the Indian Pacific's makin' time

Oh the Indian Pacific she goes rollin' down the trackFive thousand miles to travel before she's there and backFrom the waters of the western sea to the eastern ocean sandThe Indian Pacific spans the landOh the Indian Pacific spans the land

Original Map

Why?A logical extension for all the train enthusiasts to addition to Rail USA and Rail Europe.

ConceptRather than use the linear train journeys for this map, i broke with that and divided the rails into State Rails.

This provides a more "classic" continent setup, rather than the linear setup of previous rail maps.

Small rail networks in smaller states provide good opportunity to gain continents early in the game, and there will be extra bonuses for connecting mineral towns marked 'M' to their ports marked 'P'.

DesignThe very simple design of the stations has the standard army box plus a boomerang over the top of the station.

The outline for the Australian continent is a form of aboriginal artwork, taken from aboriginal drawings...the large dot clusters represent a meeting place and the three line connecting these clusters represent the travels and journeys of the poeple in the meeting places....quite appropriate i think!

first thing i noticed was that WARail has 1 border. then i looked at the minerals and ports and added the continent bonus and got a staggering 11 bonus for just 1 border. not good. not good at all.

second thing i looked at was the ports and minerals on the map. chances are a player may start with huge bonuses. imagine a 2p game where a guy has 3 minerals and 3 ports. that's an 18 bonus from the start. game over in round 1. and getting 3p and 3 m is very easy considering there are 9 of each. heck, a lucky guy might get even more, like 6p and 6m which means 72 bonus.

so you need 2 things.

1. add more connections to the map, either by adding rails or by making ports connect
2. you need to lower the minerals bonus to 1 and then lower the chances of getting it by making 1p+2m=+1

“In the beginning God said, the four-dimensional divergence of an antisymmetric, second rank tensor equals zero, and there was light, and it was good. And on the seventh day he rested.”- Michio Kaku

I noticed the same ^^ with rail WA, it looks very enticing and certainly a game winner once you have it.

Perhaps connecting ports would open up its borders a little? (was this already in the plan? it's not mentioned anywhere)

Another option might be to add in some sort of truck/bus/plane sort of concept? not sure which, something to open up the top end of wa.

What does the dotted line from TNC to MTI do?

Do minerals go to -all- ports? or only their nearest one, specific to each mineral? Sending from MLL to Syd wouldn't make sense, bonus wise... Also would you have to have the connection? not just the start and end? ie, Len-Klg-Esp? not just Len and Esp?

Graphically, I'd like to see some sort of great barrier reef added off the coast of queensland/nsw, just to look nice and attract tourists!

Do the aboriginal meeting place circles represent any particular place? Could they perhaps provide a link up between the ports?

It's looking good and I like the idea. The more Aus maps the better imho

whitestazn88 wrote:honestly, i feel like this is a better concept than rail usa and rail europe, although i may be partial because of my poor record on the rail usa map... but i like the idea

Kewl...but this is a rail map with quite different aspects.

DiM wrote:first thing i noticed was that WARail has 1 border. then i looked at the minerals and ports and added the continent bonus and got a staggering 11 bonus for just 1 border. not good. not good at all.

second thing i looked at was the ports and minerals on the map. chances are a player may start with huge bonuses. imagine a 2p game where a guy has 3 minerals and 3 ports. that's an 18 bonus from the start. game over in round 1. and getting 3p and 3 m is very easy considering there are 9 of each. heck, a lucky guy might get even more, like 6p and 6m which means 72 bonus.

so you need 2 things.

1. add more connections to the map, either by adding rails or by making ports connect 2. you need to lower the minerals bonus to 1 and then lower the chances of getting it by making 1p+2m=+1

Thanks for comment DiM....how does this new V2 below address some of those issues?

Tieryn wrote:I noticed the same ^^ with rail WA, it looks very enticing and certainly a game winner once you have it.

Perhaps connecting ports would open up its borders a little? (was this already in the plan? it's not mentioned anywhere)

No it wasn't in the plan, but is now.

Another option might be to add in some sort of truck/bus/plane sort of concept? not sure which, something to open up the top end of wa.

More rail added to top end of WA to reflect the development of mineral wealth occuring there...and now connected by Future Rail.

What does the dotted line from TNC to MTI do?

Future Rail connects as per map.

Do minerals go to -all- ports? or only their nearest one, specific to each mineral? Sending from MLL to Syd wouldn't make sense, bonus wise... Also would you have to have the connection? not just the start and end? ie, Len-Klg-Esp? not just Len and Esp?

Yes, there are now Minerals to Port pairs where the bonus +1 is only now applicable

Graphically, I'd like to see some sort of great barrier reef added off the coast of queensland/nsw, just to look nice and attract tourists!

Not enough room and was never going to happen...not in the design.

Do the aboriginal meeting place circles represent any particular place? Could they perhaps provide a link up between the ports?

No they don't mean anything, they are purely for design. Being close to ports is mere coincidence.

Thanks for your comments Tieryn. Great work and thought.

Version 2 below

Changes:
1. Legends moved around
2. Mineral->Port pairs developed for pairing bonus +1
3. More rail added to top of WA.
4. More bonuses for long distance passenger services.
5. All ports connect.
6. There is a Future Rail concept, where new lines could possibly be added to open-up the country.
7. Continent given a bevel.

anyway. i still think the chances of an opponent starting with a big bonus are pretty big. don't know the exact chance but in 2 or 3 p games i think somebody will get bonuses right from the start.

and speaking of bonuses, the bonus for long distance passenger services is a nice addition but it has a big problem of being hard to spot. for example by the time i read the whole indian pacific route and identify the stations on the map i think i'll miss my turn.
perhaps marking each bonus with a coloured dot and then adding that dot to the stations?

“In the beginning God said, the four-dimensional divergence of an antisymmetric, second rank tensor equals zero, and there was light, and it was good. And on the seventh day he rested.”- Michio Kaku

DiM wrote:v3 is better. easier to read except for the blue text on the water.

anyway. i still think the chances of an opponent starting with a big bonus are pretty big. don't know the exact chance but in 2 or 3 p games i think somebody will get bonuses right from the start.

is there anything really wrong with that given the spread of terts.

and speaking of bonuses, the bonus for long distance passenger services is a nice addition but it has a big problem of being hard to spot. for example by the time i read the whole indian pacific route and identify the stations on the map i think i'll miss my turn.

i luv u when u exaggerate...u do it so well LOL

perhaps marking each bonus with a coloured dot and then adding that dot to the stations?

I'm not sure a coloured dot would be helpful to the rest of the colour schemata,,,i don't want this ot end in mayhem/chaos whatever Hehehehe!
However, a simple box with I in it might be appropriate on the left over the station for the Indian-Pacific. I'll see what i can dooooooo - didgeridoo, doo, dooooooooooooooooooo

DiM wrote:v3 is better. easier to read except for the blue text on the water.

anyway. i still think the chances of an opponent starting with a big bonus are pretty big. don't know the exact chance but in 2 or 3 p games i think somebody will get bonuses right from the start.

is there anything really wrong with that given the spread of terts.

it depends. as i said i don't know the exact chances to get a some ports and resources in 2-3 player games but surely i wouldn't want a guy going first with 6 extra armies. i would be at a great disadvantage.

cairnswk wrote:

and speaking of bonuses, the bonus for long distance passenger services is a nice addition but it has a big problem of being hard to spot. for example by the time i read the whole indian pacific route and identify the stations on the map i think i'll miss my turn.

i luv u when u exaggerate...u do it so well LOL

cairnswk wrote:

perhaps marking each bonus with a coloured dot and then adding that dot to the stations?

I'm not sure a coloured dot would be helpful to the rest of the colour schemata,,,i don't want this ot end in mayhem/chaos whatever Hehehehe!However, a simple box with I in it might be appropriate on the left over the station for the Indian-Pacific. I'll see what i can dooooooo - didgeridoo, doo, dooooooooooooooooooo

a box a dot i don't care. as long as it's some sort of identifier so that people don't have to look at the map and then at the text and then back at the map and back at the text and so on.

“In the beginning God said, the four-dimensional divergence of an antisymmetric, second rank tensor equals zero, and there was light, and it was good. And on the seventh day he rested.”- Michio Kaku

now the biggest problem I see is Adelaine/ALB (dunno long name, think) because it gives you a bonus of 8 for only keeping those 2 as border! Dunno about a solution, but I know as hell I would take that if I play this map!
+ that part is easely expandable, via SARail that is

Another thing, nice port/mineral stuff, thou in QRail the top 2 look way to similar in color, make 1 orange or so?

thats it for now, I am not going into the extra bonusses unless I find the time and will to copy your map and draw those lines out in paint (hard to see them hé)

Emperor of the BeneluxFounder of the Commonwealth of PlanetsFounder and CEO of JF